The Total Economic Impact™

Of The UiPath Platform

Productivity Gains, Reduced Errors, And Accelerated
Data Migration Projects Enabled By RPA

NOVEMBER 2021

A FORRESTER TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ STUDY COMMISSIONED BY UIPATH

Table Of Contents Consulting Team: Jan ten Sythoff
Executive Summary .............................................. 1
The UiPath Platform Customer Journey .............. 6
Key Challenges ................................................... 6
Composite Organization ...................................... 7
Analysis Of Benefits ............................................. 8
Productivity Gains................................................ 8
Data Migration Cost Savings And Reduced Time
To Value.............................................................. 9
Error Reduction And Compliance Cost Savings ..10
Unquantified Benefits..........................................11
Flexibility ............................................................12
Analysis Of Costs ................................................13
Software License Fees .......................................13
Planning And Implementation Costs ...................14
Ongoing Costs (CoE And Citizen Developers) ....15
Financial Summary ..............................................18
Appendix A: Total Economic Impact...................19
Appendix B: Supplemental Material ....................20
Appendix C: Endnotes .........................................20

ABOUT FORRESTER CONSULTING

Forrester Consulting provides independent and objective research-based consulting to help leaders succeed in their
organizations. For more information, visit forrester.com/consulting.

© Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved. Unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited. Information is based on
the best available resources. Opinions reflect judgment at the time and are subject to change. Forrester ®, Technographics®,
Forrester Wave, RoleView, TechRadar, and Total Economic Impact are trademarks of Forrester Research, Inc. All other
trademarks are the property of their respective companies.

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION

Executive Summary
Enterprises must constantly find ways to increase efficiency and reduce costs. Robotic
process automation (RPA) allows an enterprise to build, implement and manage
software robots that can undertake data-related human processes and tasks with the
potential of faster, more consistent, and lower-cost operations. The UiPath Platform is
designed to improve productivity, accelerate data migration projects, reduce errors, and
support growth in the adoption of RPA across the organization.

The UiPath Platform includes a portfolio of products

and services to enable enterprises to identify, build, KEY STATISTICS
test, and manage automations. Software
automations, or bots, can be built and implemented
to complete various tasks and processes faster, more
efficiently, and more accurately than humans.

UiPath commissioned Forrester Consulting to

Return on investment (ROI) Net present value (NPV)
conduct a Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study and
examine the potential return on investment (ROI)
97% $5.94M
enterprises may realize by deploying the UiPath
Platform.1 The purpose of this study is to provide less time and at lower cost. Additional components of
readers with a framework to evaluate the potential the platform were then implemented to continue to
financial impact of the automation platform on their scale their capabilities and automate more
organizations. processes. Key results from the investment include
significant productivity improvements, reduced errors,
To better understand the benefits, costs, and risks
and compliance-related issues, and faster data
associated with this investment, Forrester interviewed
migrations.
four decision-makers with experience using the
UiPath Platform. For the purposes of this study,
Forrester aggregated the interviewees’ experiences “I can imagine that in the future we
and combined the results into a single composite will have one person per team as the
organization. UiPath subject matter expert.”
Prior to using the UiPath Platform, these interviewees
Project manager, business services
noted how their organizations were looking for ways
to leverage digital technologies to become more
efficient. Repetitive, data-based tasks undertaken
KEY FINDINGS
manually are a suboptimal use of resources and tend
to result in a high level of errors. Quantified benefits. Risk-adjusted present value
(PV) quantified benefits include:
After the investment in the automation platform, the
interviewees became more efficient: tasks and • Gains in productivity reaching 225,000 hours
processes that were automated were completed in in Year 3. The time savings delivered by

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 1

 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
automation is the biggest benefit of the UiPath
Platform, freeing up employee time typically
spent on manual, repetitive, data-based tasks. In
the case of the composite organization, 25,000
hours are saved in Year 1, 95,000 in Year 2, and
225,000 in Year 3. The present value of the risk-
adjusted productivity benefit is over $7,703,000
for the composite organization. This includes a
50% productivity conversion, given that not all
freed-up time necessarily goes back to
productive use.
“In the first year we saved 26,000
hours; in the second it was nearly
150,000.”
Finance systems director, financial software
• Reductions in data migration project costs
and time to value. Automations can be used to
support IT projects, typically where a lot of data is
migrated from one system to another, instead of
a manual approach. Not only does this reduce
project costs, but it accelerates project
completion, typically by 50% or more. The three-
year, risk-adjusted present value of this benefit is
more than $2,238,000 to the composite
organization.
• Reduction in errors and compliance issues.
By automating repetitive data processes and
tasks, the UiPath Platform reduces human error.
As a result, time is saved checking and correcting
errors and compliance issues. Other compliance-
related costs, such as fines, are also reduced.
Such cost savings for the composite
organization, presented as a three-year, risk-
adjusted present value, come to almost
$2,141,000.
THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION
“Our long-term goal is to scale the
use of automation across the
business to save 1 million hours.”
Director of operational excellence and
robotics, financial services
Unquantified benefits. Benefits that are not
quantified for this study include:
• Improved employee experience. By reducing
the amount of repetitive, manual tasks,
employees have more time for higher-value,
strategic projects. This, in turn, can improve
employee-related metrics such as staff turnover,
absenteeism, and discretionary effort.
▪ Improved customer experience. Some
automations streamline customer-related
processes, and so improve their overall
experience. As a result, customer-related
metrics, such as loyalty and average spend,
improve.
Costs. Forrester identified three categories of costs:
• Software license fees. The software license
fees are the annual subscription costs paid to
UiPath for access to the various components of
its automation platform. Over the three years, the
risk-adjusted present value of these fees
amounts to almost $1,394,000 for the composite
organization.
• Planning and implementation costs. These
comprise of UiPath’s’ implementation fees, third-
party professional service support fees, and the
internal resources required to support the
planning, testing, and implementation of the tool.
To the composite organization, this yields a
three-year, risk-adjusted present value of
$160,600.
2
 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

• Maintenance and training costs for the center

of excellence (CoE) and citizen developers.
The biggest cost component is for the
identification, development, and maintenance of
the automations. This comprises of the
employees in the CoE, as well as the time and
effort of citizen developers. These costs over the
three years amount to a risk-adjusted present
value of about $4,586,000 to the composite
organization.

The decision-maker interviews and financial analysis

found that a composite organization experiences
benefits of more than $12.08 million over three years
versus costs of about $6.14 million, adding up to a
net present value (NPV) of over $5.94 million and an
ROI of 97%.

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 3

 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

ROI BENEFITS PV NPV PAYBACK

97% $12.08M $5.94M <6
months

Benefits (Three-Year)

Productivity gains $7.7M

Data migration cost savings and reduced

$2.2M
time to value

Error reduction and compliance cost

$2.1M
savings

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 4

 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
TEI FRAMEWORK AND METHODOLOGY
From the information provided in the interviews,
Forrester constructed a Total Economic Impact™
framework for those organizations considering an
investment in the UiPath Platform.
The objective of the framework is to identify the cost,
benefit, flexibility, and risk factors that affect the
investment decision. Forrester took a multistep
approach to evaluate the impact that the UiPath
Platform can have on an organization.
DISCLOSURES
Readers should be aware of the following:
This study is commissioned by UiPath and delivered by
Forrester Consulting. It is not meant to be used as a
competitive analysis.
Forrester makes no assumptions as to the potential ROI
that other organizations will receive. Forrester strongly
advises that readers use their own estimates within the
framework provided in the study to determine the
appropriateness of an investment in the UiPath Platform.
UiPath reviewed and provided feedback to Forrester, but
Forrester maintains editorial control over the study and its
findings and does not accept changes to the study that
contradict Forrester’s findings or obscure the meaning of
the study.
UiPath provided the customer names for the interviews
but did not participate in the interviews.
THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION
DUE DILIGENCE
Interviewed UiPath stakeholders and Forrester
analysts to gather data relative to the UiPath
Platform.
DECISION-MAKER INTERVIEWS
Interviewed four decision-makers at
organizations using the UiPath Platform to
obtain data with respect to costs, benefits, and
risks.
COMPOSITE ORGANIZATION
Designed a composite organization based on
characteristics of the interviewees’
organizations.
FINANCIAL MODEL FRAMEWORK
Constructed a financial model representative of
the interviews using the TEI methodology and
risk-adjusted the financial model based on
issues and concerns of the decision-makers.
CASE STUDY
Employed four fundamental elements of TEI in
modeling the investment impact: benefits, costs,
flexibility, and risks. Given the increasing
sophistication of ROI analyses related to IT
investments, Forrester’s TEI methodology
provides a complete picture of the total
economic impact of purchase decisions. Please
see Appendix A for additional information on the
TEI methodology.
5
The UiPath Platform Customer Journey
Drivers leading to the automation platform investment
Interviewed Decision-Makers
Interviewee Industry
Project manager Business services
Finance systems director Financial software
Infrastructure architect Oil and gas
Operations director Financial services
KEY CHALLENGES
Prior to investing into the UiPath Platform, each of
the four decision-makers’ organizations had not
implemented automation but were looking for ways to
modernize processes. In each case, digital
transformation was an important focus and
implementing automation supported this transition,
either from the start or at a later stage.
“We identified RPA as an important
tool to form part of our broader digital
transformation efforts.”
Infrastructure architect, oil and gas
The interviewees noted how their organizations
struggled with common challenges, including:
• Competitive and investor pressure to reduce
costs. Most organizations were continually
looking for ways to reduce costs, improve
efficiency, and complete tasks and processes in
shorter time. Such pressures were particularly
strong in areas of the business seen as cost
centers, such as finance, customer service, and
IT.
THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION
Global Revenue Number Of Employees
~$10.0 billion 33,200
~$8.0 billion 10,000
~$9.0 billion 9,700
~$2.3 billion 2,100
• Inefficient methods for repetitive, time-
consuming tasks and processes. A lot of
resources and time were being used for
completing the same common manual
processes, such as checking an address or
number on a web page, back-office accounting
tasks, data input, and settling invoices.
• Time and effort dedicated to resolving errors.
Taking data from one place and manually
inputting it somewhere else resulted in errors.
Checking for and correcting mistakes took
additional time and effort. Some errors inevitably
led to more costly issues, including compliance-
related issues.
• Need for long-term automation scalability.
While decision-makers’ organizations quickly
grasped the benefits of automation, it was also
important to ensure that a platform was chosen
that supported long-term scalability and high
adoption of RPA across the business.
“There was a lot of interest around
RPA, and we wanted to improve
employee skillsets.”
Finance systems director, financial software
6
 THE UIPATH PLATFORM CUSTOMER JOURNEY

COMPOSITE ORGANIZATION
Based on the interviews, Forrester constructed a TEI
framework, a composite company, and a ROI
analysis that illustrates the areas financially affected.
The composite organization is representative of the
four organizations that Forrester interviewed and is
used to present the aggregate financial analysis in
the next section. The composite organization has the
following characteristics:

Description of composite. The composite

organization is a global enterprise headquartered in
North America. It has approximately 10,000
employees and $8 billion in annual revenue.

Deployment characteristics. The composite forms

its initial CoE with four developers and one manager.
With IT and management support, the UiPath
Platform is implemented internally with an initial focus
in the finance department. The initial implementation
comprises of four Studio seats, 13 bots, and
additional services like Orchestrator and other
integrations. In Year 2, the citizen development
program is initiated, with 50 citizen developers
trained. In this same period, the CoE grows to 12
people. In Year 3, additional CoE resources are
added, not only to develop new automations, but also
to manage and maintain existing ones. The number
of citizen developers increases to 350.

Key assumptions
• $8 billion revenue
• 10,000 employees
• $80,000 average salary

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 7

Analysis Of Benefits
Quantified benefit data as applied to the composite

Total Benefits
Ref. Benefit Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Total Present Value

Atr Productivity gains $712,500 $2,707,500 $6,412,500 $9,832,500 $7,703,137

Data migration cost savings

Btr $900,000 $900,000 $900,000 $2,700,000 $2,238,167
and reduced time to value
Error reduction and
Ctr $198,000 $752,400 $1,782,000 $2,732,400 $2,140,661
compliance cost savings

Total benefits (risk-adjusted) $1,810,500 $4,359,900 $9,094,500 $15,264,900 $12,081,965

PRODUCTIVITY GAINS “We initially targeted the biggest

Evidence and data. The most important benefit for processes with the biggest
all the interviewed decision-makers was the efficiencies. It might have been better
productivity gains the UiPath Platform delivered. The to start smaller in the interest of
number and size of the automations varies greatly accelerating our learning.”
depending on an organization’s needs, from a task
Infrastructure architect, oil and gas
that saves an employee an hour a week to a process
that affects all contact center staff.

• In Year 3, the CoE is operating 92 automations in

total, while the citizen developers build total
Modeling and assumptions. In the case of the
reaches 750. Together, these save 225,000
composite organization:
hours.
• In Year 1, four CoE developers create 13
• It is assumed that the average salary of the
automations, resulting in 25,000 hours saved.
employee making these productivity gains is
• In Year 2, an additional 25 automations are built $80,000, which is equivalent to a fully loaded
by the CoE, and the first citizen developers hourly rate of $60.
create 100 small automations. Altogether, this
saves the composite organization 95,000 hours.
Risks. The key risks associated with this benefit are:

“In the first year we focused on
several smaller automations. We
saved 25,000 hours from high-volume
low-value automations. Then in the
second year we focused on two larger
ones and saved 148,000 hours.”
• The number and size of automations created
varies from one organization to another.
• The impact of the automations also varies.
• The salary of the average employee impacted
may also be lower.

Finance systems director, financial software

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 8

 ANALYSIS OF BENEFITS

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester

adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a
three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%)
of about $7,703,000.

Productivity Gains
Ref. Metric Source Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

A1 Number of hours saved Interviews 25,000 95,000 225,000

A2 Average FTE hourly rate (fully loaded) Composite $60 $60 $60

A3 Productivity conversion factor TEI Standard 50% 50% 50%

At Productivity gains A1*A2*A3 $750,000 $2,850,000 $6,750,000

Risk adjustment ↓5%

Atr Productivity gains (risk-adjusted) $712,500 $2,707,500 $6,412,500

Three-year total: $9,832,500 Three-year present value: $7,703,137

DATA MIGRATION COST SAVINGS AND completed in much less time, enabling the new
REDUCED TIME TO VALUE system to go live sooner.

Evidence and data. Interviewees shared several

examples whereby automation was used to facilitate
Modeling and assumptions. To quantify this benefit
data migration.
for the composite organization:
• The financial services organization built a UiPath
• It is assumed that there is one data migration
Platform automation to take over the process of a
project requirement per year.
legacy mainframe it was moving away from.
• Automating this task saves $500,000 on average.
• The business services organization automated
the process of migrating 1.6 million customer • The data migration project would have taken a
records from its legacy system. Not only was this year, but it instead takes just six months.
done at much lower cost, but it was also
• The average project value, or the value of the
final application, is $10,000,000.
“To move the 1.6 million customer Risks. This benefit can be lower in other
records to the new CRM system environments given that:
would have required 4 FTEs for a
whole year. We used 10 bots, • The cost savings could be lower.
completed the task in three months,
• The time saved could be less.
and saved $900,000.”
• The size of the projects could be smaller.
Project manager, business services

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 9

 ANALYSIS OF BENEFITS

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester

adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a
three-year, risk-adjusted total PV of over $2,238,000.

Data Migration Cost Savings And Reduced Time To Value

Ref. Metric Source Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

B1 Number of data migration projects impacted Interviews 1 1 1

B2 Average cost saving per data migration Interviews $500,000 $500,000 $500,000

B3 Average reduction in project time (months) Interviews 6 6 6

B4 Average project value Estimate $10,000,000 $10,000,000 $10,000,000

Value of reduced time to project completion (10%

B5 (B3/12)*10%*B4 $500,000 $500,000 $500,000
discount rate)

Bt Data migration cost savings and reduced time to value B2+B5 $1,000,000 $1,000,000 $1,000,000

Risk adjustment ↓10%

Data migration cost savings and reduced time to value

Btr $900,000 $900,000 $900,000
(risk-adjusted)

Three-year total: $2,700,000 Three-year present value: $2,238,167

ERROR REDUCTION AND COMPLIANCE COST

SAVINGS
Evidence and data. The rate of errors and mistakes
fell when manual processes were automated. This
was particularly the case for repetitive tasks when
focus can wane and human errors creep in.
The automation of data migrations also greatly
reduced errors. The business services organization
described one such project to migrate customer data
records to a new system, which would have taken
much longer and required more resources.

• The financial services organization automated a
process which checked that no payments were
made to known terrorists. In addition to the hours
saved in automating this process, which included
regularly checking an updated online list, it
reduced the number of false positives. This in
turn saved additional time correcting the issue.
Modeling and assumptions. To quantity this benefit
for the composite organization, it was assumed that:
• For every 20 hours saved, one error is avoided.
• The average error takes 1 hour to correct.
• For every 1,000 hours saved, one compliance
issue is avoided.

• The average compliance event requires 10 days

“Compliance and risk management of effort to resolve.
have benefitted because of reduced
• Ten percent of these avoided compliance events
errors.”
would have resulted in a regulatory fee of
Product manager, RPA and legal, financial $10,000.
software

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 10

 ANALYSIS OF BENEFITS

• Employees correcting errors and resolving
compliance issues earn a salary of $80,000 on
average.
Risks. There are a few risks which could result in a
lower financial benefit:
• The number of errors was already much lower.
• The time to correct an error would be lower.
• The number of compliance events was already
lower.
• The time to resolve a compliance event could be
lower.
• The portion of compliance events that result in a
regulatory fee could be lower.
• The average compliance fee could be lower.
Results. To account for these risks, Forrester
adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a
three-year, risk-adjusted total PV of almost
$2,141,000.

Error Reduction And Compliance Cost Savings

Ref. Metric Source Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

C1 Number of errors avoided Assumption 1,250 4,750 11,250

C2 Error correction time saving Composite 1,250 4,750 11,250

C3 Average fully loaded hourly rate Composite $60 $60 $60

C4 Error avoidance cost savings $75,000 $285,000 $675,000

C5 Number of compliance events avoided Composite 25 95 225

C6 Number of days for 1 FTE to fix compliance event Assumption 10 10 10

Percentage of compliance events resulting in regulatory

C7 Assumption 10% 10% 10%
fee

C8 Average regulatory fee Assumption $10,000 $10,000 $10,000

C9 Compliance-related cost savings (C5*C6*C3*8)+(C5*C7*C8) $145,000 $551,000 $1,305,000

Ct Error reduction and compliance cost savings C4+C10 $220,000 $836,000 $1,980,000

Risk adjustment ↓10%

Error reduction and compliance cost savings (risk-

Ctr $198,000 $752,400 $1,782,000
adjusted)

Three-year total: $2,732,400 Three-year present value: $2,140,661

UNQUANTIFIED BENEFITS employees can spend more time on higher-value,

Additional benefits that customers experienced but
were not able to quantify include:
• Improved employee experience. By reducing
the amount of repetitive, manual tasks,
strategic focus areas. A better employee
experience leads to higher engagement, reduced
turnover, reduced absenteeism, better customer
experience, and increased discretionary effort.
Furthermore, citizen development provides

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 11

 ANALYSIS OF BENEFITS

employees with the opportunity to learn new skills

and gain new experiences.

“The employee feedback is clear: they

could never go back to doing those
manual tasks.”

Finance systems director, financial software

▪ Improved customer experience. Some

automations improve customer-related
processes. For instance, the financial services
organization automated invoice payments,
meaning customers and partners were paid
faster and with less friction. Other automations
make contact center agents more efficient,
improving how they can support customers.

“With invoices paid faster, there has

also been an improved customer
experience.”

Operations director, financial services

FLEXIBILITY
The value of flexibility is unique to each customer. In
the case of the UiPath Platform, its modular approach
offers additional opportunities in the future from an
investment today. Additional components are
available which help to identify and prioritize
opportunities, reduce development costs, and
address new and specialized areas of the business.

Flexibility would also be quantified when evaluated as

part of a specific project (described in more detail in
Appendix A).

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 12

Analysis Of Costs
Quantified cost data as applied to the composite

Total Costs
Ref. Cost Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Total Present Value

Dtr Software license fees $0 $157,500 $367,500 $1,260,000 $1,785,000 $1,393,557

Planning and
Etr $160,600 $0 $0 $0 $160,600 $160,600
implementation costs
Ongoing costs (CoE
Ftr $0 $615,120 $1,576,080 $3,626,040 $5,817,240 $4,586,043
and citizen developers)
Total costs (risk-
$160,600 $772,620 $1,943,580 $4,886,040 $7,762,840 $6,140,200
adjusted)

adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of almost

SOFTWARE LICENSE FEES
$1,394,000.
Evidence and data. The software license fees
included all the different components of the UiPath
Platform. This included the desktop applications to
create the automations for both for CoE developers
and citizen developers, the bots, and other
components of the platform.

Modeling and assumptions. In the case of the

composite organization, it was assumed that in
addition to some integrations and services costs, the
license fee details are as follows:

• In Year 1, the licensing fees cover 13 bots, four

Studio licenses, and Orchestrator.

• In Year 2, the fees cover 27 bots, 10 Studio

licenses, 50 citizen developer licenses, and Test
Suite.

• In Year 3, the number of bots grows to 104, 18

developers need Studio, and the organization
has 350 citizen developer licensees; the Hub and
Process Mining components are also included.

Risk. It is possible that other organizations will need

more bots or other components to fit the UiPath
Platform to their needs.

Results. To account for this risk, Forrester adjusted

this cost upward by 5%, yielding a three-year, risk-

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 13

 ANALYSIS OF COSTS

Software License Fees

Ref. Metric Source Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

D1 License fees Interviews $150,000 $350,000 $1,200,000

Dt Software license fees D1 $0 $150,000 $350,000 $1,200,000

Risk adjustment ↑5%

Dtr Software license fees (risk-adjusted) $0 $157,500 $367,500 $1,260,000

Three-year total: $1,785,000 Three-year present value: $1,393,557

PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTATION COSTS
Evidence and data. The interviewees shared that
they had to allocate some resources and effort
upfront to plan and implement the solution. This
included:
• Third-party support.
• Planning, project management and change
management resourcing. Included in this group
was the time needed to identify and prioritize
initial tasks and processes to be automated.
• IT involvement for implementation and security
testing. It was also important to ensure that bots
could be tracked and controlled.
Modeling and assumptions. In the case of the
composite organization:
• It requires 50 days of third-party support, costing
$1,000 per day.
• It needs eight FTEs, including two IT
administrators, four developers, one project
manager, and one manager. On average, each
individual has to allocate 25 days to
implementation.
• The average salary for these eight FTEs is
$80,000.
Risks. The cost and effort required for planning and
implementation could be higher because:

• Skillsets and capabilities are more limited.

“We wanted to ensure we were
• More third-party support is required.
complying to security policies – bots
need to be onboarded like contractors • Average salary rates are higher.
and have to have an id and password
so they can be tracked and controlled. Results. To account for these risks, Forrester
” adjusted this cost upward by 10%, yielding risk-
adjusted total of $160,600.
Finance systems director, financial software

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 14

 ANALYSIS OF COSTS

Planning And Implementation Costs

Year Year Year
Ref. Metric Source Initial
1 2 3
E1 Third-party support Composite $50,000

Internal FTEs required for planning,

E2 Composite 8
implementation, and training

E3 Average days per FTE for implementation Interviews 25

Average fully loaded FTE for implementation

E4 Composite $480
(daily rate)

Et Planning and implementation costs E1+(E2*E3*E4) $146,000 $0 $0 $0

Risk adjustment ↑10%

Etr Planning and implementation costs (risk-adjusted) $160,600 $0 $0 $0

Three-year total: $160,600 Three-year present value: $160,600

ONGOING COSTS (COE AND CITIZEN • In some cases, the customers worked with third
DEVELOPERS) parties as there were limited resources with the
skills to build automations. In all cases, however,
Evidence and data. The largest cost component is
the customers have strived to build internal
the time to develop and manage the automations in
capabilities.
the UiPath Platform. This includes the training and
development time for employees building, monitoring,
and maintaining the automations.
“Today our central of excellence
• In all four of the customers interviewed, a center
comprises of 25 FTEs, including
of excellence was created comprising mainly of
junior and senior developers,
dedicated developers and analysts, but also
architects, administrators and some
some administrators and managers to monitor
IT support.”
and maintain bots and automations. In most
cases there was only a single centralized CoE, Infrastructure Architect, oil and gas
but the oil and gas organization had created
smaller CoEs in departments including finance
and supply chain management.
• The size and growth of the CoE also varied.
• To continue scaling and building out automations, Some of the customers started small to initially
the customers started rolling out citizen assess the technology and its fit. UiPath’s flexible
development, whereby simpler versions of the solution and free online training resources were
development tool were used by employees attractive in this regard for some of the
interested to learn something new. These costs customers.
are also captured in this category.

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 15

 ANALYSIS OF COSTS

• Similarly, the degree to which citizen developers Results. To account for these risks, Forrester
were involved varied. One organization had adjusted this cost upward by 10%, yielding a three-
trained 500 employees in eight months and has a year, risk-adjusted total PV of more than $4,586,000.
long-term goal to scale to one citizen developer
in every 10 employees. Others are growing more
slowly, conscious of cultural sensitivities, the
strain it could put on the business, and the need
to manage and monitor automations.

Modeling and assumptions. In the case of the

composite organization:

• No third-party assistance will be required, as

skills are developed in-house.

• The CoE starts with five FTEs in Year 1, 12 in

Year 2, and 24 in Year 3.

• The average salary of these FTEs is $80,000,

with a mix of junior and senior developers.

• It takes 10 full days of training for each new

developer.

• The citizen development program starts in Year

2, with a total of 50 citizen developers trained.
This grows to 350 in Year 3. The average salary
is assumed to be the same as in the CoE.

• New citizen developers require an average of

three days training.

• On average, two successful automations are

created for every citizen developer in their first
year, and one in their second year; each of these
automations takes 6 hours.

Risks. There are three risks which could make these

estimates higher for other organizations:

• The salary rate of the CoE and citizen developers

could be higher.

• The training time can take longer.

• The citizen developer development time could be

longer.

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 16

 ANALYSIS OF COSTS

Ongoing Costs (CoE And Citizen Developers)

Ref. Metric Source Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

F1 Number of dedicated FTEs for CoE Composite 5 12 24

F2 - of which developers/ analysts 4 10 18

Average fully loaded (+35%) CoE

F3 Composite $108,000 $108,000 $108,000
developer salary

F4 Number of new developers Assumption 4 6 8

Training time for new developers

F5 Interviews 10 10 10
(days)

F6 Total CoE costs (F1*F3)+(F4*F5*F3/5/45) $0 $559,200 $1,324,800 $2,630,400

F7 Number of citizen developers Composite 0 50 350

Average fully loaded citizen

F8 $80,000 salary rate*1.35/5/45 0 $480 $480
developer daily rate

F9 Number of new citizen developers F6(yrn+1)-F6(yrn) 0 50 300

Training time for new citizen

F10 Interviews 0 3 3
developers (days)
Development time for citizen 6 hours per automation, 2 automations
F11 0 600 3,900
developers (hours) in 1st year and 1 in 2nd year

F12 Total citizen developer costs ((F9*10)+(F11/8))*F8 $0 $108,000 $666,000

Ongoing costs (CoE and citizen

Ft F6+F12 $0 $559,200 $1,432,800 $3,296,400
developers)

Risk adjustment ↑10%

Ongoing costs (CoE and citizen

Ftr $0 $615,120 $1,576,080 $3,626,040
developers) (risk-adjusted)

Three-year total: $5,817,240 Three-year present value: $4,586,043

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 17

Financial Summary

CONSOLIDATED THREE-YEAR RISK-ADJUSTED METRICS

Financial Analysis (risk-adjusted)

$10,000,000
The financial results calculated in the
Benefits and Costs sections can be
$8,000,000
used to determine the ROI, NPV, and
payback period for the composite
$6,000,000 organization’s investment. Forrester
assumes a yearly discount rate of 10%
$4,000,000 for this analysis.
Cash flows

$2,000,000

$0
These risk-adjusted ROI,
($2,000,000) NPV, and payback period
values are determined by
applying risk-adjustment
($4,000,000) factors to the unadjusted
results in each Benefit and
($6,000,000) Cost section.
Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

Total costs Total benefits Cumulative net benefits

Cash Flow Analysis (Risk-Adjusted Estimates)

Present
Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Total
Value
Total costs ($160,600) ($772,620) ($1,943,580) ($4,886,040) ($7,762,840) ($6,140,200)

Total benefits $0 $1,810,500 $4,359,900 $9,094,500 $15,264,900 $12,081,965

Net benefits ($160,600) $1,037,880 $2,416,320 $4,208,460 $7,502,060 $5,941,765

ROI 97%

Payback
<6 months
period

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 18

Appendix A: Total Economic
Impact
Total Economic Impact is a methodology developed
by Forrester Research that enhances a company’s
technology decision-making processes and assists
vendors in communicating the value proposition of
their products and services to clients. The TEI
methodology helps companies demonstrate, justify,
and realize the tangible value of IT initiatives to both
senior management and other key business
stakeholders.
TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT APPROACH
Benefits represent the value delivered to the
business by the product. The TEI methodology
places equal weight on the measure of benefits and
the measure of costs, allowing for a full examination
of the effect of the technology on the entire
organization.
Costs consider all expenses necessary to deliver the
proposed value, or benefits, of the product. The cost
category within TEI captures incremental costs over
the existing environment for ongoing costs
associated with the solution.
Flexibility represents the strategic value that can be
obtained for some future additional investment
building on top of the initial investment already made.
Having the ability to capture that benefit has a PV
that can be estimated.
Risks measure the uncertainty of benefit and cost
estimates given: 1) the likelihood that estimates will
meet original projections and 2) the likelihood that
estimates will be tracked over time. TEI risk factors
are based on “triangular distribution.”
The initial investment column contains costs incurred at “time
0” or at the beginning of Year 1 that are not discounted. All
other cash flows are discounted using the discount rate at the
end of the year. PV calculations are calculated for each total
cost and benefit estimate. NPV calculations in the summary
tables are the sum of the initial investment and the
discounted cash flows in each year. Sums and present value
calculations of the Total Benefits, Total Costs, and Cash Flow
tables may not exactly add up, as some rounding may occur.
THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION
PRESENT VALUE (PV)
The present or current value of
(discounted) cost and benefit estimates
given at an interest rate (the discount
rate). The PV of costs and benefits feed
into the total NPV of cash flows.
NET PRESENT VALUE (NPV)
The present or current value of
(discounted) future net cash flows given
an interest rate (the discount rate). A
positive project NPV normally indicates
that the investment should be made,
unless other projects have higher NPVs.
RETURN ON INVESTMENT (ROI)
A project’s expected return in
percentage terms. ROI is calculated by
dividing net benefits (benefits less costs)
by costs.
DISCOUNT RATE
The interest rate used in cash flow
analysis to take into account the
time value of money. Organizations
typically use discount rates between
8% and 16%.
PAYBACK PERIOD
The breakeven point for an investment.
This is the point in time at which net
benefits (benefits minus costs) equal
initial investment or cost.
19
Appendix B: Supplemental Material
Related Forrester Research
“The RPA Market Has Reached A Defining Moment,” Forrester Research, Inc., August 13, 2021

“Optimize Processes With Automation And Robotics,” Forrester Research, Inc., August 2, 2021

“The Forrester Wave: Robotic Process Automation, Q1 2021,” Forrester Research, Inc., March 15, 2021

Appendix C: Endnotes

1
Total Economic Impact is a methodology developed by Forrester Research that enhances a company’s
technology decision-making processes and assists vendors in communicating the value proposition of their
products and services to clients. The TEI methodology helps companies demonstrate, justify, and realize the
tangible value of IT initiatives to both senior management and other key business stakeholders.

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 20

THE TOTAL ECONOMIC IMPACT™ OF UIPATH AUTOMATION 21